"A gape-jawed serpentine shape of pale metal crested with soot hung high for a sign."

Tuesday, 8 June 2010

And this too shall pass...

Yes, I know all of this happened a while back. Yes, I've been out of touch. Yes, we'd be better off with these guys still around.

I went to an author event with Mailer in Glasgow when he was promoting The Gospel According to the Son in 1997. It was thoroughly enjoyable: he was funny, a professional performer, perfectly happy to engage with his audience, and really quite sweet...he was tiny and stout, a wee ball of an old man. He didn't have a lot of energy, it's true (as he carefully poured a glass of water he joked, "At my age everything become existential - you don't know if you're going to make it") but his voice was still good: he did superb impersonations of Truman Capote and Gore Vidal during a mock obituary of himself, written in the early '80s, which should have been printed alongside all the real ones. I'm glad I made a point of going.

About Me

There is nothing - absolutely nothing - half so much worth doing as simply messing about in books.
Born in Inverness; grew up in Scotland, England and Canada. Have lived mostly in and around Edinburgh since 1990.